Zucchini
| Zucchini | ||||||||||||||
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 Zucchini vegetable and spent flower on plant | ||||||||||||||
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| Cucurbita pepo L. | ||||||||||||||
Zucchini (IPA: /zu'kini/, in North American and Australian English) or courgette (IPA: /kʊə'ʒɛt/, in New Zealand and British English) is a small summer squash. Its Scientific name is Cucurbita pepo (a species which also includes other squash). It can either be yellow or green or light green, and generally has a similar shape to a ridged cucumber, though a few cultivars are available that produce round or bottle-shaped fruit. Unlike the cucumber, it is usually served cooked. It can be prepared using a variety of cooking techniques, including steamed, boiled, grilled, stuffed and baked, barbecued, fried, or incorporated in other recipes such as souffles. It also can be baked into a bread. Its flower can be eaten stuffed and is a delicacy when deep fried as tempura. Many people find zucchini is best when quickly cooked so it still retains its firmness and flavor, and 2 to 4 minutes is all it takes to cook a zucchini to perfection. With additional cooking it falls apart into a watery mass, which for some styles and tastes, may be the objective, as when cooking a ratatouille. (It should be noted though that there are variations on ratatouille where many of the vegetables get done to either the barely cooked or medium cooked stage.) Culinarily, zucchini is treated as a vegetable which means it is usually cooked and presented as a savory dish or accompaniment. However, biologically, the zucchini is an immature fruit, being the swollen ovary of the female zucchini flower. Zucchini are usually picked, when used for food, when the seeds are soft and immature, seldom over 8in/20cm in length. Mature zucchini can be as much as three feet long, but are often fibrous and not appetizing to eat.
The zucchini has a delicate flavor and can be appreciated with little more than quick cooking with butter or olive oil, with or without fresh herbs. There is no need to remove the skin. Quick cooking of barely wet zucchini in oil or butter means it can partially boil and steam and then the juices are concentrated in the final moments of frying when the water has gone prior to serving. Variations on this are to use the zucchini as a vehicle to enjoy the flavor of a simple or well prepared sauce. Zucchinis can also be eaten raw, in a cold salad, as well as hot and barely cooked in hot salads, as in Thai or Vietnamese recipes.
Zucchini is one of the easiest vegetables to cultivate in a temperate climate. As such, zucchini has a reputation among home gardeners for overwhelming production, and a common type of joke among home growers revolves around creative ways of giving away unwanted zucchini to people who already have been given more than they can use. One good way is to harvest the flowers, which nips the fruit production in the bud (so to speak) and provides what to many is a true delicacy. Zucchini flowers are very expensive in markets because of the difficulty in storing and transporting them. The male flower is borne on the end of a stalk and more long lived.
While easy to grow, zucchini, like all squash, requires plentiful bees for pollination. In areas of pollinator decline or high pesticide use, such as mosquito spray districts, gardeners nowadays frequently experience fruit abortion, where the fruit begins to grow, then rots or dries and does not continue growth. This is due to an insufficient number of pollen grains delivered to the female flower, and can be corrected by hand pollination or by increasing bee populations.
Zucchinis with the flowers attached are a sign of a truly fresh and immature fruit, and are especially sought by many people.
Zucchini fruit should not be stored long, up to three days. They are prone to chilling damage which is expressed as sunken pits in the surface of the fruit especially when brought up to room temperature after cool storage.
In 2005, a poll of 2,000 people revealed the Zucchini to be Britain's 10th favourite culinary vegetable. In Mexico, the flower (known as Flor de Calabaza) is preferred over the vegetable, and is often cooked in soups or used as a filling for quesadillas. In El Salvador, calabaza is a common ingredient in pupusas, usually as calabaza y queso (and cheese).
Closely related, to the point where some seed catalogs do not make a distinction, are Lebanese summer squash or kusa, which closely resemble zucchini but often have a lighter green or even white color.
Flower
The Zucchini flower can be male or female. The female flower is a golden blossom on the end of each baby zucchini. The male flower grows directly on the stem of the Zucchini plant in the leaf axils (where leaf petiole meets stem) on a long stalk and is slightly smaller than the female. Both flowers are edible, and provide a great way to dress a meal or garnish the cooked fruit.
Firm and fresh blossoms that are only slightly open are cooked to be eaten, with pistils removed (for female flowers) and stamens removed for male flowers. Inspect and remove any insects from inside the flowers. The stem on the flowers can be retained as a way of giving the cook something to hold onto during cooking, rather than injuring the delicate petals, and also gives a way of delivering the morsel to the mouth, or they can be removed prior to cooking, or prior to serving. There are a variety of recipes in which the flowers may be deep fried as fritters or tempura (after dipping in a light tempura batter), stuffed, sautéed, baked, or used in soups.
History and etymology
Zucchinis, like all summer squash, has its ancestry in the Americas. But while most summer squash―including the closely related cocozelle and marrow―were introduced to Europe during the time of European colonization of the Americas, zucchini is European in origin, the result of spontaneously occurring mutations (also called "sports"). In all probability, this occurred in the very late 19th century, probably near Milan (early varieties usually included the names of cities in the area in the name). The alternate name Courgette comes from the French name of the fruit, with the same spelling. It is a diminutive of courge, meaning squash. While "zucca" is the Italian word for squash, and the feminine diminutive plural "zucchine" is preferred in most areas of Italy, the male diminutive plural "zucchini" is used in other areas of Italy, Australia, and the United States. The first records of zucchini in the United States date to the early 1920s. It was almost certainly brought over by Italian immigrants, and probably got its start in California.
Nutrition
The zucchini vegetable is low in calories (approximately 15 food calories per 100 g fresh zucchini) and contains useful amounts of folate (24 mcg/100 g), potassium (280 mg/100 g) and vitamin A (384 IU [115 mcg]/100 g.
1/2 cup of zucchini also contains 19% of the recommended amount of Manganese, which activates the body's fat burning enzymes, resulting in a faster metabolism.
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